Paying the Price
by snapesgirl21
Summary: Re-released. A look at Ranger's POV during the bridge scene in Takedown Twenty, with an AU twist afterwards. One-shot. Completed.


_A/N: This one-shot is dedicated to margaret aka whymelucylu, who posted the 500__th__ review on my story "A Matter of Perspective" and won the honor of choosing a prompt (this was before I had deleted the stories last year). _

Raindrops started hitting my windshield as I parked in the space next to Stephanie's car. I was curious to find out if she had any information about people at the Senior Center who might have been capable of murdering Melvina Gillian. I wasn't interested in private investigation, but Rupert Gillian had Rangeman accounts for his sixteen businesses and two homes, so I felt he'd given me enough business to warrant a favor. Part of my willingness had also been the fact that the murdered women were all around the same age as my grandmothers, and if they had been killed and thrown in dumpsters I wouldn't want to stop until I'd found the son of a bitch who had done it.

Stephanie was relaxing in her living room with a glass of wine when I walked into her apartment. I was immediately turned on when I saw how beautiful she looked wearing a white t-shirt and striped pajamas in her bare feet. I pictured her sitting on the couch in my living room, wearing the same outfit with her glass of wine, waiting for me to come up from my office to spend the night making love to her. The reality of that happening wasn't very likely because her desire to only be sleeping with one man at a time, and my concerns of what too much emotional intimacy with Stephanie might mean.

I had noticed a change in my feelings for Stephanie in the past several months, ever since we ended up in Hawaii together. Sleeping with Stephanie again since the one and only time we'd been together two years earlier had brought up a lot of emotions that I'd worked hard to suppress. I knew I loved her, but had told myself—and her— that it was in my own way, which teetered on the border of friendship and romantic love. But after spending two weeks in a five-start resort enjoying her body and attention, I knew that I couldn't keep lying to myself—I was in love with her. Big time. Which was a problem because I couldn't bring myself to settle down and commit to her. I knew she struggled with her feelings for both Morelli and me, and I didn't want to make things worse for her by letting her know just how much emotion I had invested in her when I wasn't prepared to give her what she wanted and deserved in a relationship.

I hadn't intended to add the 'right now' when I'd told Stephanie that I wasn't ready to pay the price of being in a relationship with her, but she'd caught on and had asked about it. I'd dismissed it by saying I wasn't likely going to be willing to pay the price at any time and had moved on to find out what she'd learned at bingo. I didn't want to give her hope where there may not be any, especially since the word going around had been that she and Morelli were close to getting engaged. Kicking me out of her apartment a few minutes later because Morelli would come over after the baseball game got rained out had frustrated the hell out of me. Ever since her close call with being burned alive by Orin and buried in an unmarked grave by Sunshine, I'd wanted nothing more than to spend a night lost in her body.

I saw Morelli on Hamilton as he drove towards Stephanie's and I drove away. He acknowledged me with a nod as he passed, having little doubt that I was coming from her apartment. Morelli was confusing at times. I knew that Stephanie considered Morelli to be an_ Alpha male_ like me, but in reality he wasn't that much like me. He struggled to control his emotions, and was a control freak of a different sort. Instead of watching Stephanie's back, he was constantly wanting her to change. His feelings on her involvement with me were hypocritical. Tensions had built up after the first time Stephanie and I had slept together. I wasn't sure if she had actually told Morelli, or if he had simply suspected, but he had wanted her keep her distance from me and intervened any time he suspected sparks were flying between us. It had been almost two years before I'd slept with Stephanie again, which was when the tension reached critical mass. I wasn't sure if he'd suspected she'd been sleeping with me during the _vordo_ curse, but he'd had no doubt she was sleeping with me when he'd showed up at our hotel room in Hawaii. After he had thrown the first punch, I had taken advantage of the situation and unleashed my frustration with Morelli and his relationship with Stephanie on his face until she'd stunned us both. After we'd regained consciousness in the emergency room and declined to press charges against one another, we'd had a tense conversation about how to proceed.

"You need to stay away from her," Morelli had said as he held an ice pack to his broken nose. "She won't stay away from you because she's in love with you, but you can keep away from her."

"The only way I'm going to stay away from her is if I'm dead. Unless you're prepared to kill me, I suggest you accept that I'm here to stay," I had replied, excluding the fact that I couldn't stay away from her for the same reason she couldn't stay away from me.

Since Hawaii, we'd been able to find a balance of sorts in our respective relationships with Stephanie. Morelli would pass her on to me when she needed help that he couldn't provide, and I would alert Morelli when I felt he needed to know something about her safety or needs. It was incredibly fucked-up, but it was the reality of the situation at the moment. As I pulled into the garage at Rangeman, the realization hit me that I was jealous of Morelli. He may not be ready to fully commit to Stephanie in terms of marriage and family, but he was able to commit to her more than I could in terms of an emotional and physical relationship. I knew I had no right to be jealous of him. I was nearly certain that if I told Stephanie I was ready for a relationship with her, she would be in my arms. My emotional limitations had helped her restrain her own feelings better than if I had been open with her. I could say the words and have her to myself, but I hadn't. And I wasn't sure if I ever could.

I ended up on patrol with Tank the next morning, as the two men who were supposed to be doing the northern partrol were out sick. One had some sort of food poisoning that I suspected was actually a hangover and the other had torn his ACL playing basketball on his day off.

"Did Stephanie tell you about Sunny?" Tank asked as we headed to the first account on the route.

"What about him?"

"That he got an ass full of buckshot when she tried to apprehend him at his girlfriend's house last night," Tank said, fighting a smile. "Apparently the buckshot was meant for Stephanie, but Rita Raguzzi's a bad shot."

I fought a smile. "I hadn't heard that. She only told me that she'd gotten kicked out of bingo at the Senior Center when Lula got in a fight with someone named Mildred."

"Your girl's a mess."

And I loved her anyway.

We were about halfway through our route when my phone rang and the display told me it was Stephanie.

"Babe."

I listened but could only hear rustling. "Babe?"

After a few seconds I heard Stephanie start yelling "Help! Let me in! Please!" and it sounded like she was pounding on a door.

Before I could respond, it sounded as though the phone had hit the ground and I could hear men's voices.

"Get her tied to the block and handcuffed before she wakes up," said one man. "And grab her shit. We'll throw it in the river with her."

I muted my phone so that my voice couldn't be heard on the other end of the line. "Track Stephanie's bag. She's in trouble."

Tank got on the line with the control room while I continued to listen on the phone. I couldn't hear anything at this point except rustling. I imagined the kidnappers had thrown her phone into her messenger bag.

"She just turned off of Sixteenth and is headed west on Calhoun," Tank informed me, turning right onto Hamilton. "Hal and Gino are headed that way as well. What's going on?"

"Someone subdued her and said they were going to throw her in the river."

Tank put his foot to the floor, weaving in and out of traffic. People were honking at us, but we paid them no attention. My sole focus in that moment was getting to Stephanie before she ended up in the Delaware. Given that they were driving down Calhoun, I imagined that they were headed to the Calhoun Street Bridge. Of all the bridges in Trenton, it would be the easiest to dump a body from because of the setup of the guard rails. Tank took a right on Broad Street, listening to Diaz in the control room giving him directions.

"They're stopped just before the state line on the Calhoun Street Bridge," Diaz reported as Tank took a left on State Street. "Do we need police involved?"

"Yes," I said. "Tell them Stephanie has been kidnapped."

If it was possible to go faster, Tank made it happen as we turned onto Calhoun. There was ice in my veins as I thought about what was happening to Stephanie. My phone showed that the call was still connected, so it was likely that her bag hadn't been thrown into the river. I listened in again, but I didn't hear anything.

Traffic was moving slowly on the bridge as we reached it. I had a bad feeling as to why. Tank took the shoulder, flying down the bridge between cars and the guard rail with barely a foot clearance on either side. I could see a black Lincoln and an SUV parked on the shoulder and three men were standing by the rails, looking at something that seemed to be stuck in the rail. Tank laid on the horn, startling the men. They took off for the SUV as Tank slammed on the brakes. I had my door open before we'd even come to a complete stop and ran over to the guard rail. I could see as I got closer that the thing the men had been looking at was a concrete cinder block with a rope tied around it. The block had gotten lodged between rails. I climbed the rail and looked over to see Stephanie hanging by one foot, handcuffed behind her back. She was struggling against the pull of the rope, but it making the knot around her ankle loosen. She looked up and saw me climbing over the guardrail. I had no sooner told her to stop moving when the knot came loose and Stephanie went plummeting towards the Delaware River, screaming as she tried to figure out what to do.

I threw my other leg over the guard rail and went into the water after her, keeping an eye on where she landed. She had managed to curl herself into a fetal position as best she could with her restrained hands before she hit the water. I hit the water seconds later. Hitting the water from fifty feet felt like running into a wall, but I immediately began to search for Stephanie under the water. I could see her a few feet to my left, trying to figure out what to do. I knew it would be almost impossible for her to kick up to the surface with her hands restrained behind her. I swam over to her, getting underneath her and pushing her up to the surface of the water. Once she had gotten air, I followed suit and broke through the water, trying to keep ahold of her. She went under briefly as I got my arm around her waist and pulled her into me. The current of the river was too strong to swim against, so I floated us along, working to get to the shore. Tank, John, Rafael and Luis were in the water as we reached the point where we could walk the rest of the way. I saw a police car and an ambulance waiting behind them. I searched my pockets and found that my handcuff keys hadn't fallen out and into the river. I unlocked Stephanie's cuffs as Tank wrapped a blanket around her. I pulled her into me, wrapped my arms around her and rested my cheek against hers, taking in the reality of what had happened. I'd jumped off a bridge to save her and had been successful. She was breathing and walking, so I felt sure that she wasn't seriously injured.

"You're okay. You're safe."

I was telling her that, not as much for her own peace of mind, but for my own. She was okay. She was safe. I felt her nod against me and I pulled back to look her over and asked how she was doing. She was trembling from the adrenaline rush and the chill that was setting in from being drenched in cold river water. I could see her nipples hard through her shirt, but managed to push the thoughts related to that aside in that moment. I sent her with Tank so that she could go home to shower and change. I had to talk to the police to make sure they found the assholes that had done this to her.

"Hal and Gino are following the SUV along with the police," Rafael informed me as we stepped out of the water. "The SUV is registered to one of Sunucchi's goons."

I talked to the police, giving my statement regarding the phone call from Stephanie and tracking her bag to the bridge. Everyone on the Trenton police force knew I tracked Stephanie, and that I'd go to hell and back for her. Carmen Lopez, the mother of one of my employees, was a dispatcher for the police department and had told her son that there had been a pool going for three years as to whether Stephanie ended up with Morelli or me. There were apparently very good odds on her ending up with me. Once I'd finished giving my statement, Luis came up to tell me that the police had apprehended the three men who had kidnapped Stephanie and they were on their way to the jail. I nodded my understanding, feeling a small sense of relief. Not that I was worried that they could get to her while Tank was with her, but knowing that they were in police custody was a relief nonetheless. Rafael handed me my cell phone, which Tank had left with him before taking Stephanie home, and I dialed Morelli.

"Did you really just jump off a bridge to save Stephanie?" Morelli asked as soon as the call connected.

"Yes, and she's fine. Tank is taking her back to her apartment. She should be there by now."

"Damn," Morelli said. "That's her third close call in how many days? I don't know how much more I can take."

Me neither, I thought as I disconnected the call. It was third time I'd managed to save Stephanie from being killed in the last two weeks, each time being a closer call than the last. This time had been horribly close, and the thought made me feel sick as I recalled the image of her falling from the bridge. I hadn't been so shaken by one of Stephanie's close calls since the time that Constantine Stiva had kidnapped her, and her shoved into a cabinet. I'd been terrified that she was dead as I'd reached up for her, and had never felt such relief before as when I saw her looking at me as she fell into my arms. I was struggling to find that same sense of relief in this situation. It had been too close this time.

I rode back to the office with Luis and Rafael, replaying the event in my mind. Seeing the woman I loved fall from a bridge had been one of the most terrifying moments of my life. I'd jumped off that bridge without hesitation, my only thought was to get her to the surface and then to the shore. I hadn't thought about whether I might break something hitting the water from such a height or if I couldn't find Stephanie once submerged. I told the men to keep tabs on what was happening with kidnappers' arraignment while I went up to my apartment to wash the Delaware off of me and to get into dry clothes.

I kicked my shoes off at the door and walked to the kitchen where I took off my utility belt and started emptying my pockets. I'd lost my Glock in the river, but my backup was still in place in my ankle holster, as was my knife. My wallet and its contents were soaked, so I emptied it and laid everything out on the kitchen island to dry. I took a quick inventory of everything and found that only my Glock was missing. A few things might be ruined, but could be replaced easily enough. Thankfully, the most important thing hadn't been lost. She was irreplaceable.

I stripped out of my clothes once I reached the bathroom, leaving them in a pile by the door. I stepped into the shower and turned the water on as hot as I could stand it. I stood under the shower and put my palms against the wall, lowering my head between my arms. I couldn't get rid of the image of Stephanie falling from the bridge, and the sound of her terrified scream reverberated around my brain. Then the _what-if _scenarios started running through my mind. _What if she hadn't called me? What if they hadn't taken her phone or bag with her when they'd thrown her in the trunk of the car? What if I'd been two minutes later getting to her?_ She could have drown before I could have found her in the river, or she could have disappeared with no way of possibly knowing where she'd gone. Her body could have floated to shore after a few days, decaying from time in the water and exposure to animals that would have undoubtedly started to feed on her. I immediately started heaving in the shower at the thought. It had been several hours since I'd eaten, so nothing came up as I wretched, but my body shook from the exertion. I had to get away from that line of thinking. Stephanie _had_ managed to call me while fleeing her kidnappers. I _had_ managed to get to her in time and she was now safe in her home. I'd left a man in her lot, watching for anyone else who might decide to finish the job that Moe, Shorty and the other man hadn't been able to do.

Once I'd scrubbed the smell of the Delaware River from my skin and hair, I dressed in my work uniform, grabbed a spare gun from my safe and an extra wallet from my dresser. I put the most important surviving items back in my wallet, grabbed my weapons and headed down to the office. As I walked across the control room floor, I noticed the volume of voices had been louder than usual. The men glanced my way briefly before turning back to their respective jobs. They were used to me going after Stephanie, but jumping off bridges wasn't common, even in my line of work. Tank was waiting for me in my office when I arrived.

"I just got off the phone with Carl Costanza. Those assholes got released on bond," he told me, looking pissed off.

"Who was the judge?"

"Henderson."

Judge Brian Henderson was a known alcoholic and gambling addict. There was no doubt in my mind that Sunucchi had bribed him into setting bail for the three men and had subsequently provided collateral for the bonds.

"Get me everything you have on those men and Sunucchi," I said. "I have a general idea of what we're dealing with on Sunucchi's end, but I don't know these other guys."

Tank left without a word and set to work. I spent the next few hours in my office, trying to focus on the reports from my business manager, but not doing a very good job of it. Stephanie's scream and the vision of her falling kept interrupting my thoughts regardless of how hard I tried to fight them.

I gave up trying to work at six and headed to Stephanie's apartment. The man I'd left in the lot reported that Morelli had arrived at her place about an hour after her, stayed for a few minutes and had left again. No one of interest had entered the building, and Stephanie hadn't left. Once I'd pulled into a space next to Stephanie's car, the Rangeman SUV pulled out and headed towards the office. I let myself into her apartment and listened for her. The apartment was silent, so I quietly shut the door and walked into her bedroom. She was lying on her back with a pillow over her face, and didn't move when I'd walked in the room. I went over to sit on the edge of the bed next to her and waited for her to wake up. I watched her while I waited, thinking about how I wanted nothing more than to cover her body with my own and not leave her bed for a week. Or until Morelli walked in on us and shot me, whichever came first.

All afternoon, in between the instant replays of the bridge incident, I'd been thinking about my feelings for Stephanie and our relationship. I'd nearly lost her only hours before, and it had made everything in our past seem trivial. The flirting, the kisses and occasional sexual encounters didn't seem enough anymore. The idea of her in Morelli's bed and him buried inside her was now more sickening than ever. I'd told her I wasn't ready to pay the price of being in a relationship with her only yesterday, but a lot had happened since then. Suddenly it seemed such a very small price to pay for all the good it would bring. It actually didn't feel like a price at all. It felt like a privilege.

I pulled the pillow off of her, which woke her up. She said she was doing great, which bothered me. Stephanie's resiliency was both a good and bad thing. I was glad that she didn't let the bad things in life get her down, but I worried she didn't actually deal with things the way she needed to. I'd had my own experience with PTSD during my time in the Army, and had learned to process trauma better as a result. My fear was that everything that had happened to her would overwhelm her one day and she wouldn't be able to cope. She'd seemed surprised by my confession that the morning's events had gotten to me, and that I worried about everything. _Everything_ meant anything to do with her, including her well-being and love life.

She stared up at me from the bed for a moment and I could tell the wheels in her brain where spinning. Was she starting to reconsider her feelings for me? Had something clicked in her today the way it had in me? Had falling from Calhoun Street Bridge changed us both?

"Would you consider moving into Rangeman until we get this sorted out?" I asked her, hoping she'd say yes. I was tempted to drag her caveman-style to my apartment if she said no.

She hesitated and had just opened her mouth to answer when her cell phone rang from the bedside table. It turned out to be her grandmother, who was wondering why Stephanie was late picking her up for bingo.

"I've gotta go," she said, scrambling out of bed. "Crap! I don't have a car!"

"It's in your lot," I told her as I stood up. "I'll catch up with you after bingo. Please consider moving in with me until you're safe again."

Stephanie looked me in the eye, and I could tell there was more that she wanted to say. "I will."

I left her lot and waited for her around the corner. I was going to monitor her for the evening to be sure no one made a move on her while she was with her grandmother. They could have Edna Mazur, but I'd kill them before they had a chance to hurt Stephanie.

I sat across the street from the firehouse and watched for suspicious activity for the next two hours, but nothing came up. Stephanie and Edna came out of the firehouse a little after nine. Stephanie was carrying a bulky box, but I couldn't tell what it was from where I was parked in an alley. I followed her as she dropped her grandmother off at home and headed to her apartment. I pulled in next to her and climbed out as she was retrieving the box from the backseat of her car. I nearly burst into laughter when I saw that she was carrying a slow cooker, the second laziest cooking invention after the microwave. I couldn't think of anything more perfect for Stephanie, though I doubted she knew how to work one.

Once inside her apartment, she informed me that she didn't think there was a connection between bingo and the murdered women, which was a disappointment, but I didn't care to give it too much thought. I had bigger things to talk about with Stephanie.

"Have you thought any more about coming to Rangeman for a little while?" I asked, leaning up against her kitchen counter.

She bit on her bottom lip and looked at a spot directly over my shoulder. My heart sank a little as I prepared myself to hear the 'I'm almost engaged to Morelli so it would be awkward' speech. We'd been down this road several times, and she'd almost always taken the path to Morelli. The couple of times that she'd actually stayed with me had been pleasant, but frustrating because she had worked hard to not screw around with me while she was in a relationship with Morelli.

"This confuses me," she began. "What I feel for you confuses the _hell_ out of me. Being in love with two men is horrible, especially when we all have commitment issues."

I raised my eyebrows fractionally. The conversation wasn't going the way I'd thought it would.

"But then today, you jumped off of a bridge to save me. _OFF A BRIDGE!_" she emphasized. "And it was the most heroic and romantic thing I've ever experienced. Then you tell me how much you worry about me and how much this incident affected you, but then I think about telling me you probably won't ever be ready to pay the price of being in a relationship with me, and it leaves me even more confused. I don't know where the hell I'm going with Morelli, but I know it won't be to an actual engagement. He's never going to really be ready for that until I'm no longer involved with bond enforcement or you. I don't see myself in any other job, and I definitely don't see myself ever being without you in my life. But I need to know if there is ever going to be a chance with you."

I could hear my heart pounding in my ears in the silent apartment. I needed the right words to tell her just how I felt, but struggled to find them. I took a moment to formulate what I wanted to say before I spoke.

"I know what I said yesterday, but after watching you fall off a bridge today and considering all of the alternative scenarios of that event, I've come to realize that I am ready for there to be more between us," I began, maintaining eye contact with her. "I don't know that I'll ever be ready for marriage and a family, but I know that I want you in my arms and my bed every night. I want you in every way I can have you, and I want you exactly as you are."

Stephanie looked floored at my words, and she stared at me with her lips slightly parted for several seconds after I finished speaking. I knew she had her own commitment issues, and I wondered if my words had been too much for her.

"You really want a relationship with me?" she finally asked in a soft voice.

"Yes."

Stephanie closed the distanced between us and wrapped her arms around my neck before kissing me. I put my hands on her waist and pulled her into me, deepening the kiss. She pulled away from my lips and kissed a path along my jawline to my ear, where she stopped and whispered, her breath on my skin sending a rush through my body.

"I'm all yours."


End file.
